Gladys Kalema-Zikusoka (born 8 January 1970) is a veterinarian and founder of Conservation Through Public Health, an organisation dedicated to the coexistence of endangered mountain gorillas, other wildlife, humans, and livestock in Africa. She was Uganda's first woman to be the country's wildlife veterinary officer and was the star of the BBC documentary, Gladys the African Vet. In 2009 she won the Whitley Gold Award for her conservation work.
Interested in animals since the age of 12 while growing up in Kampala, Kalema-Zikusoka started a wildlife club at her school and organised trips to Queen Elizabeth National Park.[1], [2] Her professional studies began when she won a scholarship to study at the University of London Royal Veterinary College.[3]
Kalema-Zikusoka is married to Lawrence Zikusoka, a technology entrepreneur and one of the co-founders of Conservation Through Public Health. They have two children.
When Kalema-Zikusoka was 25, she was appointed to be the veterinary officer for the Ugandan Wildlife Service, which later merged with Uganda's national parks to become the Uganda Wildlife Authority.[4] She was first woman to hold that position.[5] She pioneered the first wildlife translocations to restock Uganda's national parks following years of poaching during Uganda's civil wars.
As part of her veterinary research, she identified parasite transmission from humans to mountain gorillas as a significant risk factor for gorillas.[6]
Following her demonstration of pathways for human diseases to harm or kill gorillas, Gladys Kalema-Zikusoka, Lawrence Zikusoka, and Stephen Rubanga then founded Conservation Through Public Health to improve both human and ecological health in Africa.[7] CTPH is a non-profit organisation based in Uganda and the USA that conducts programs that protect gorillas and other wildlife from human and livestock disease risk; that reduce human and livestock diseases in the vicinity of wildlife; that increase the local use of family planning; and that use Information/Communication Technology both to help local development and to educate people about the environment.[8] Kalema-Zikusoka is the CEO of the organisation.
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